Plus: How hit-making legend Quincy Jones created superstars and changed pop history
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Sleeve Notes
Picks of the week
Stars and writers on the songs that define punk spirit
Anger is an energy!  
Stars and writers on the songs that define punk spirit
As Patti Smith’s debut single turns 50, punk musicians and music writers pick the songs that define the genre’s resistance, rebellion and refusal
From Dizzy to Donna to Stevie  
How hit-making legend Quincy Jones created superstars and changed pop history
‘I had to keep telling myself it was real’  
Jazz guitarist Pat Metheny on crafting hits with Joni Mitchell and David Bowie
‘You got it or you didn’t’  
The sweat, smoke and sonic excess of the indie scene pre-Britpop
Interview  
Wrangling with Abba, risking jail for the Stone Roses … the lawyer behind pop’s big spats
Let the panic begin!  
Glastonbury reveals new process for online ticket purchases
Reviews
Alexis Petridis's album of the week  
Linkin Park: From Zero – rock’s risk takers win big with punchy comeback
Linkin Park: From Zero – rock’s risk takers win big with punchy comeback
Album review  
Primal Scream: Come Ahead – Bobby Gillespie’s most personal album yet
Contemporary album of the month  
Distant Voices, New Worlds – avant-garde vision of Albion by bright British composers
Album review  
Sofie Royer: Young-Girl Forever – existential crises you can dance to
Album review  
Actress: Дарен Дж Каннінгем – elegant mixtape leans into abstraction
Album review  
Du Blonde: Sniff More Gritty – a gleefully self-sufficient affair
Spotlight
Our sportswriters and arts critics swap jobs
‘I’ve stumbled deep into alien territory’  
Our sportswriters and arts critics swap jobs
What would happen if our arts critics and sports writers swapped roles for a day? How does the English National Opera compare to the Premier League … or the NFL to a West End musical? Our experts found out last week
Classical
‘A shot of adrenaline for tired ears’  
Our classical writers on the music that energises them
Our classical writers on the music that energises them
Concert review  
WEDO/Barenboim – optimism and despondency as visionary conductor returns to London
WEDO/Barenboim – optimism and despondency as visionary conductor returns to London
Classical album of the week  
The Frans Brüggen Project – Horsch’s fascinating recorder review
The Frans Brüggen Project – Horsch’s fascinating recorder review
Album review  
Brahms: Piano Sonata No 1; Schubert: Wanderer Fantasy, D760 – beautifully shaped works and a bravura performance
Brahms: Piano Sonata No 1; Schubert: Wanderer Fantasy, D760 – beautifully shaped works and a bravura performance
The Q&A  
Andrea Bocelli: ‘I don’t like lies. They always have short legs, especially the ones we tell ourselves’
Andrea Bocelli: ‘I don’t like lies. They always have short legs, especially the ones we tell ourselves’
Feature  
What are you Haydn? The hoaxers who fooled the classical music world
What are you Haydn? The hoaxers who fooled the classical music world
Add to playlist
Ranked  
Top of the pips: Fiona Apple’s 20 greatest songs
Top of the pips: Fiona Apple’s 20 greatest songs
Delicate ballads, bold brass and the thrill of Thriller  
10 of Quincy Jones’s greatest productions
Honest playlist  
Julian Casablancas: ‘Last Nite by the Strokes is dead to me’
One to watch  
Lambrini Girls
You may have missed
How LGBTQ+ events like Homobloc are going large
‘Our community deserves a global stage’  
How LGBTQ+ events like Homobloc are going large
The rise of queer music festivals and big outdoor raves has brought visibility and empowerment to a culture once confined to underground clubs. But expansion has led to accusations of selling out
Feature  
Quincy Jones and Frank Sinatra: the audacious partnership that rocketed them to another planet
Jones was behind many inflection points in American music, but it all began with a brotherhood with Ol’ Blue Eyes
‘It’s shocking no-one’s done this before’  
The 13-hour gig digging up the African roots of global pop
With a marathon performance and album, the wildly ambitious Chromesthesia charts centuries of intercontinental music. Its creator explains why she’s asking big questions about the true owners of culture
‘Played on over 250 albums’  
Was Nicky Hopkins the greatest unsung pianist ever?
He helped shape classic songs by the Rolling Stones, The Who and the Beatles but his influence on music has been largely ignored. A new documentary aims to correct that
‘One thing goes wrong and that’s it’  
How Janet Jackson’s career was wrecked in a split second
Paula Varjack’s theatre show Nine Sixteenths looks back at the 2004 Super Bowl ‘Nipplegate’ controversy and what it reveals about the pressures on black women in the public eye
In pictures  
Birth of the cool: posters from the Montreux jazz festival through the decades
Designs by the likes of Andy Warhol and Keith Haring showcase the evolution of visual arts
Live music this week
Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds  
An incredible mass spiritual outpouring
An incredible mass spiritual outpouring
Kitty Empire's artist of the week  
Laura Marling – a sumptuous performance, with strings attached
Lulu  
Remarkable farewell tour ends one of pop’s strangest journeys
Deep Purple  
Age cannot wither these pogoing rock elders
The Cure  
An intimate, poignant show from a band more focused than they’ve been in years
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